The spring sports regular season is in its final throes before postseason madness begins. Borderite baseball took a dive after its six-game winning streak, dropping its last four games, as did softball, which lost its last three games. Boys soccer earned its third win of the season with a tight, one-goal victory over rivals Ferndale.
Blaine baseball knew exactly who it was up against when hosting Mt. Vernon, the top 3A school in the Northwest Conference (NWC), on April 29.
The Bulldogs are led by senior Xavier Neyens, a power-hitting shortstop that is a consensus first round pick in the upcoming MLB draft, and who has been committed to play at Oregon State University since the 8th grade.
The Borderites knew he was the best player in the state, and the best prospect to come out of Washington since Seattle’s Corbin Carroll was drafted 16th overall by the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2019. Everyone else in the crowd soon saw exactly what all the hype was about.
Neyens crushed the very first pitch he saw from Blaine pitcher Brady Dohner over the right center field wall for a two-run home run, showing why the Mt. Vernon native has a chance to be drafted even higher than the Rookie of the Year Award winner Carroll.
The Borderites couldn’t get back on their feet after the first inning bomb, and eventually fell to Mt. Vernon 15-2, allowing a second home run to Neyens in the late innings after hitting him with a pitch and walking him in the two at bats in between.
For the Borderites, mercifully, that was the last time the team would ever face Neyens, as he now looks to take Mt. Vernon to a 3A state championship after losing in last year’s state final.
Senior catcher Evan Yates recorded a hit, along with two hits from sophomore shortstop Aaron Garza, with Dohner knocking in both Blaine runs in the game.
The loss to Mt. Vernon finished off a tough week for the Borderites, losing four straight on the back of a promising six-game winning streak.
Blaine lost 10-0 to Oak Harbor at home on April 23, then lost a pair of close games on the road against Sehome (5-1 on April 25) and Sultan (4-3 on April 28).
The losing skid puts the Borderites at 9-9 (5-8 NWC) on the season with just a few games remaining before the postseason kicks off.
The District 1/2 1A tournament will run from Wednesday, May 7 to Saturday, May 17 at Joe Martin Stadium and Sehome High School in Bellingham.
Blaine has just two regular season games remaining, and has a chance to leapfrog second-place 1A team Meridian in the standings for a better seed come playoff time.
The Borderites will travel to play Anacortes at 4:30 p.m. Thursday, May 1, then host one final home game at Pipeline Fields on Friday, May 2 against Burlington-Edison.
Stats provided by WhatcomPreps.com
After snapping a three-game losing streak last week with a convincing 11-5 win on the road against Meridian on April 22, Blaine softball has lost three games in a row, all to NWC foes.
The Borderites couldn’t get the bats going against Lynden, losing 15-0 in five innings against the top 2A NWC team. Lynden pitcher Callie Ramerman earned her eighth win on the mound this season, striking out six batters and not allowing a single hit in five innings of work.
Against a hard-hitting Mt. Baker team, the Borderites couldn’t tighten up in the fielding department, getting dinged for seven errors in the 17-3 loss on April 26.
Despite the loss, Mesa Puls and Shaylie Daniels continued to show why they are two of the best hitters in the conference, with Puls going 2-3 with a single and double, stolen base and run scored, and Daniels jacking a two-run home run.
The final loss for Blaine was the closest, and probably hardest to swallow: a 5-4 loss to Burlington-Edison on April 29.
Blaine led 3-0 by the first inning after a bases-clearing, three run double by Aaliyah Bowman, but Burlington-Edison kept fighting back. After tying the game, Daniels hit her second home run in two games, this time a solo shot in the third to put the Borderites up 4-3.
But Burlington-Edison had the final say, with a go-ahead two-run homerun in the bottom of the third that would prove to be the finishing blow.
The Borderites will have a busy finish to the regular season, with five games over the first eight days of May. The Borderites will play Mt. Vernon at Pipeline Fields at 4:30 p.m. Thursday, May 1, then hop on the ferry to face Friday Harbor at noon Saturday, May 3.
Stats provided by WhatcomPreps.com
Blaine boys soccer earned its third win on the season against its I-5 rivals Ferndale on the road on April 29, winning a nail-biting 1-0 game.
Junior goalkeeper Abel Carlson-Vega had a stellar game defending the net, earning his third clean sheet of the season. In each of Blaine’s three wins on the year, the Borderites have shut out their opponent.
Junior midfielder Dima Yuryev scored for Blaine. It was his seventh of the season, which leads the Borderites on the year. As of April 27, Yuryev’s seven goals in the 2025 season put him squarely among the top goal-scorers in the conference.
The win put the Borderites at 3-12-0 (3-11-0 NWC) with just one regular season game remaining.
Despite the rough record, the Borderites still sit above fellow 1A Nooksack Valley and Mt. Baker in the conference standings, defeating both teams in the lone matchups each team had, giving the Borderites a tiebreaker in the standings.
With the postseason fast approaching, the Borderites are locked in as the three-seed in the five-team District 1 1A tournament. The Borderites will face either Meridian or Lynden Christian, depending on how the final game of the regular season shakes out.
During its regular season encounters, Blaine lost 3-2 to Lynden Christian on March 27, and 3-1 to Meridian on April 3. The Borderites will surely hope to avenge those losses come postseason time, and grind out a tough path to the bi-district playoff and, eventually, a state berth.
Blaine’s final regular season game is scheduled for 7 p.m. Thursday, May 1 on the road against Bellingham. The District 1 1A playoffs tournament will be held at Borderite Stadium from May 3 to May 13.
Stats provided by WhatcomPreps.com
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